THE NATURAL MAN AND THE SPIRITUAL MAN

“As God’s partners, we beg you not to accept this marvellous gift of God’s kindness and then ignore it. For God says, “At just the right time, I heard you. On the day of salvation, I helped you.” Indeed, the “right time” is now. Today is the day of salvation” [2 Corinthians 6:1-2 NLT]

It would seem that among the Corinthians who had opposed Paul were people who had accepted God’s wonderful gift of salvation but sadly they had not continued to live it out in their daily life. The Bible teaches that once we receive salvation we must work it out in our lives [Philippians 2:12], but sadly there are those who do not move forward after making that initial decision to accept Christ. My father-in-law and mother-in-law are a prime example of this. They both attended the same evangelistic meeting in 1939, and both put their hands up to accept Christ. My mother-in- law grew dramatically in her walk with God, but sadly, her husband did not go on with Christ. One accepted Christ and went on with Him, and the heart of the other was unchanged. The only comfort is that at the age of 80, he finally surrendered to Christ.

One of the most difficult issues that churches may have to deal with are the people who attend, even taking a lead role, and who think they are Christians, but are not really in a right place with God. It is questionable whether they are really saved. They operate in the flesh rather than the Spirit, making natural rather than spiritual decisions. Late in his life Paul wrote a warning to Timothy about supposed Christians who were living ungodly lives. He wrote, “They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly.”

These people may even teach but have a counterfeit faith [1 Timothy 3:1-9].

From the way that Paul wrote to the Corinthians it seems that he regarded those people who opposed him as not really saved, and he pleaded with them to be saved. This would certainly solve the problem of their attitude to Paul. In urging these people to turn to the Lord and be saved Paul quoted from Isaiah,

“In the time of my favour I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you” [Isaiah 49:8]. Later in this same epistle Paul challenges people in the church to “Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves [2Corinthians 13:5].

Questions:

Why is it so important that as God’s children we constantly examine ourselves to make sure that we are in the faith?

When Jesus spoke to the church in Laodicea, He rebuked them for being neither hot nor cold [Revelation 3:14-22]. Why do you think that their spiritual condition was such an offence to Jesus?

Why are people in the church who live and operate in a form of religion but deny the power of the Gospel in their lives so damaging to God’s work?